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Volkswagen unveils new research lab in Belmont
By Janis Mara
jmara@bayareanewsgroup.comPosted: 04/30/2011 07:08:44 AM PDT
Updated: 04/30/2011 07:08:46 AM PDT
Cars that drop you off at the movies, tootle merrily off to park themselves and then pick you up when summoned by cellphone aren't just a Jetsons-esque fantasy any more -- they're examples of the technology that the new Volkswagen Group Electronics Research Laboratory is developing.
"This will encourage other incubators, boost property taxes, bring us new jobs and beef up our tax base," said Belmont Mayor Coralin Feierbach, who showed up Friday along with Rep. Anna Eshoo, lab director Burkhard Huhnke, two robots and about 200 people to celebrate the lab's official opening.
The lab is an in-house think tank for Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini and Volkswagen. Designers, psychologists, engineers and outside partners will work together to identify new technologies and accelerate their development into future production vehicles. The technology developed in the lab will be used worldwide, according to Huhnke.
"This places the imprimatur on Belmont as part of Silicon Valley," Eshoo said.
Volkswagen's choice to expand to 40,000 square feet of space in Belmont from a smaller space in Palo Alto will boost Belmont's profile, and the 60 employees it plans to add to its current roster of 40 could also provide an economic boost for the city.
"This will attract highly entrepreneurial people who will move around in the community and frequent small businesses. It's a win-win," Eshoo said.
The building features what is quite possibly the cleanest machine shop on the Peninsula, located on the first floor of the building. Immaculate silver ducts gleam overhead, there's not a speck of dust on the floor and even the drill press is spotless. There's not even a hint of gasoline in the air.
"The building has dedicated exhaust systems," explained David Whitney, a principal of Whitney Polcyn Architects. The three-story building is in the process of becoming LEED Silver certified, which vouches for its status as environmentally friendly.
"You'll be able to pull up an app on your phone and adjust the lights in the conference room," Whitney said.
By providing lower lighting in some areas, the building will achieve a 20 percent saving in electricity, the architect said.
During a tour of the building, visitors got to watch a fetching but overworked robot playing soccer in the so-called "think tank" on the third floor.
The robot was created by students at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, one of the many universities collaborating with the lab along with Stanford and UC Berkeley.
Not only did the robot kick the ball back and forth with Dennis Hong, an associate professor at Virginia Tech, but when it tripped on the rug, it was able to get back up on its own.
Such robots are part of the research arsenal at the lab, and their suffering will eventually result in a useful product for drivers, according to Hong.
In a mock-up similar to a video game, visitors, who were mostly Volkswagen employees or associates of the lab, got to experience a pilot project by MIT's Senseable City Lab.
In the simulated environment, "drivers" grasped a steering wheel and zoomed down a virtual city street. Pointing at a bright red knife and fork icon on the dash summoned a cartoon bubble identifying nearby restaurants.
While the MIT simulation is fun, "Our main focus is safety, reducing accidents and deaths," Huhnke said.
Features that are currently found in Volkswagen vehicles, such as lane-keeping and blind-spot detection, were developed in the lab, and the company is working with Google to further develop its online navigation, combining 3D maps and satellite imagery to help drivers find available parking spots, another development of the lab.
Contact Janis Mara at 510-301-8373. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/jmara.